


comfort crowd

by mlmbitch



Category: Druck | SKAM (Germany)
Genre: (that's my favorite tag), Angst, Autistic Matteo, Character Study, David Schreibner is a Good Boyfriend, Hurt/Comfort, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Kinda?, M/M, Matteo central, Sensory Overload, Undiagnosed Autism, autistic author, i tried writing hurt/comfort but i just wrote hurt, kind of a vent, not beta read we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-27
Updated: 2020-04-27
Packaged: 2021-03-01 20:15:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23873014
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mlmbitch/pseuds/mlmbitch
Summary: Looking back, it was bound to happen at some point.or, Matteo gets sensory overload at a party
Relationships: Matteo Florenzi/David (Druck)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 83





	comfort crowd

**Author's Note:**

> i tried to write something significantly fluffier but instead this happened.
> 
> CW: if you haven't already read the tags, there's some pretty detailed description of sensory overload (i drew directly from my own experience with it), so if you feel like that might trigger you in any way PLEASE DO NOT READ.
> 
> this was not beta read, so please forgive any mistakes.
> 
> that's pretty much it, please enjoy this angst-fest!
> 
> title from comfort crowd - conan gray

Looking back, it was bound to happen at some point.

It was September. Jonas had dragged them to a party that one of the upperclassmen in his political science class was hosting at their flat. Or, well, he didn’t drag them, per se, he invited them and David seemed too excited by the idea of a party for Matteo to say no. Not that he could ever say no to David in the first place.

And so Matteo traded his “grandpa sweater,” as David called it, for a slightly more presentable (and probably a billion times cleaner, he had been wearing the sweater nonstop for the past week and a half, and hadn’t remembered to shower for at least twice that long) t-shirt -- which must of relatively been new, considering the tag was still there when he put it on -- and hit the town.

As soon as David opened the door for them to enter the stranger’s apartment, Matteo’s senses were being attacked. He knew the music was going to be loud, he could hear a muffled version of it almost as soon as they were buzzed into the apartment building and started climbing the stairs to the correct floor, but it was at least ten times louder now that he was there and there was nothing to insulate it from spilling out into the hallway.

David grabbed his hand, saying something he couldn’t quite make out over the music, and pulled him into the swarm of people that crowded the small apartment.

“Hey!”

Jonas waved them down from somewhere in the middle of the crowd and David made his way over to him, Matteo following his lead. He had a drink in hand and was talking to a few people who Matteo assumed were his classmates. Jonas pulled him into a one-armed side hug, squeezing him quickly before releasing him and giving David a hug hello as well.

“Guys, this is Matteo and his boyfriend, David.” Jonas said towards the small circle of strangers next to them. He turned to the couple. “David, Matteo, this is Noah, Finn, Maisie, and Oliver.”

“Nice to meet you,” David said, extending his hand to shake strangers’ hands while Matteo stood and waved awkwardly as the group quickly fell into conversation.

One of Jonas’s friends asked David about university and he went into a spiel about film school and his latest project, but Matteo checked out about halfway through. Some idiot decided to string colored lights, the kinds that you would put on a Christmas tree, along where the walls met the ceiling but didn’t sync up the pattern they were flashing to. There were clinking of beer bottles and plastic cups as people drank and had fun. People pushed past him as they made way to the makeshift bar in the corner of the room. Whose decision was it to stand directly in the way of the bar? Surely this was just as uncomfortable for the others in his group to be constantly jostled by drunk strangers on their way to get drunker, so why were they here? No one was actively trying to get away from the bar, though, so it couldn’t have been as big of a deal as he was making it out to be in his head.

Everything suddenly felt like it was getting louder. The music, the people, the clinks of drinks, even the subtle buzz of the lights overhead seemed _loud_ somehow. The muted smell of sweat and alcohol on the breaths of the people in front of him got stronger and the jostling of people passing him and dancing nearby got more violent. The previously darkish room was now so bright it stung his eyes.

He felt the knot that had been in his stomach ever since they arrived tighten as he realized what was happening.

Fuck.

Fuck fuck fuck _fuck_. This hadn’t happened since that party last April. The one where David brought Laura and Matteo-- well he reacted in a very _Matteo_ way. He freaked out and ran away from the problem.

It was one of the many things he and David had in common, running away from their problems. Although, David had been better at not doing that ever since the pool incident. It was something they’d both agreed to get better at together.

 _Fuck_ , he really thought he had been doing better.

He felt his eyes start to prickle and well up with water. Everything was just so fucking loud, and there were so many fucking people, and those lights just kept _fucking flashing--_

“Matteo?”

He jumped and whipped his head away from where he had been staring at the lights -- _brightbrightbrightloudloudtooloud_ \-- when he heard someone shout his name in his ear. Jonas was looking at him and oh god everybody was looking at him _fuckfuckfuckfu_ -

“Hey, buddy, you okay?” Jonas touched his shoulder. “You don’t look too good.”

_Don’ttouchmedon’ttouchmetooloudtoomuchdon’ttouchmetoomuchtoomuchtoomuch-_

“Matteo?”

His legs started moving on their own. He could hear Jonas and probably other people calling after him but all he could think was _nononostopitstopitpleasestopitbequietshutupshutupshutup._

He doesn’t know how, but he eventually ends up outside, sitting on the concrete in front of the apartment complex, hands pressed against his ears, violently rocking back and forth, hitting his back on the wall of the building behind him. He usually gets away from the situation before it can get this bad, shuts himself in his room and turns the music in his headphones all the way up to block out the outside noise, maybe smoke some weed to take the edge off. Or he’d smoke before a party so he’d be too high to get to that point in the first point. But he didn’t think to get stoned before the party, (he’d been so good about not having a freak out for the past six months, why would he?) and he didn’t have a room to shut himself in and he didn’t bring headphones to drown the noise out (again, why would he, he’d been doing so well).

Jesus, he didn't think it had been this bad since he was a kid.

He hears a door open behind him, presumably the one leading in and out of the apartment complex, and footsteps follow shortly. He doesn’t acknowledge them, just keeps rocking and hitting his back against the wall.

“Teo?” he hears David ask. It’s so quiet and soft he almost can’t hear it. He silently thanks him for that. David put his hand on his knee as he rocked, but withdrew it quickly as soon as he tensed from the touch. Matteo thanks him silently again for that.

He can feel David’s eyes on him, and he knows that he’s wearing that look of his, the one that says ‘I’m worried and I want to help you but I have no idea how’. He hates that look. It’s the same look he gave him that night in April in the kitchen, ironically the last time that something like this had happened. He should just call it the ‘Matteo freak out face’. It would be shorter than the last name.

He had know idea how he was going to explain this to him.

But, to his surprise, David didn’t ask. He didn’t ask him what happened, why ran out, why he was rude to Jonas’s friends, what in the fuck was wrong with him. He said nothing. Instead he sighed, and sat. He sat next to him and he made sure there was a safe amount of distance between them, far enough where they wouldn’t touch accidently, but Matteo could easily reach out if he needed him.

After a while, David breaks the silence. “Do you wanna talk about it?”

He shook his head no. He knew he would have to at some point, probably tomorrow, but he was too exhausted to try and find the words to explain to David something he himself didn’t fully understand.

David nodded. “Do you think you can get up?”

Matteo shook his head no again and sniffed. Tears had stopped falling at this point, the worst of it having passed since getting out of there, but he couldn’t imagine being able to move from where he was sitting, at least for now. “Too tired,” he managed to mutter.

“Okay,” David replied, still speaking softly. “Then we’ll just sit.”

And they did.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading my sleep deprived angst-fest lol. i hope you enjoyed!
> 
> follow me on twitter @wthoutoxygen :)
> 
> authors love comments/kudos!


End file.
